Day 10: My Prioities Changed

Call it starting a family, finding new hobbies, changing bad habits- whatever you want to call it- I stopped doing other things that were not helping.  I stopped drinking alcohol when I was pregnant with James.  I never started drinking again.  Still, I do not drink.  I was addicted to food and I was afraid that addiction would shift to something else- alcohol, shopping, gambling, scrapbooking- whatever.

 Since I stopped going out, many of my friendships changed, too.  Drinking buddies?  Maybe. But I am still in contact with many old friends from college and a few from high school.  I'm not the same person I was 100+ pounds ago.  Time is a major factor in much of that, too.  Working full time and juggling a family doesn't leave a lot of free time.  I do not blame my old friends, communication is a 2 way street.  I know at some point in the future when the roller coaster slows to a stop, I will see them more.  For now, I am enjoying making new friends.

I was also an avid scrapbooker. I admit it. The first step to admitting there is a problem is to stand up and say it. Before I had kids, I had a freaking scrapbook room! Seriously. I stopped scrappbooking when most people start-when they have children! Memory Makers, Stamps, punches, ink pads- you name it, I had 12. "Go Big or Go Home" seams to be my motto! I was living my life day by day, hiding away and bedazzling my memories. I wasn't living my life.  I am not knocking scrapbooking, just the fact that I scrapbooked layouts about random trees or flowers, not things that mattered.

Try this
By a notebook.  Date the page.  Write down things you want to be or do. (then email it to me...jk) Don't be realistic, dream and dream BIG. If you can't write down what you want to be or do, then we have an enormous problem. If this is you go back and read my post on honesty.

Need vs. Want
I've refereed to my husband losing his full time job several times.  He punched a time clock, worked as an auditor in a factory, came home tired, crabby and angry.  He kept his job for so long because it filled our wants.  We wanted a good paying job that provided amazing health insurance.  That's what we got, that's all we got.  A mindless job that would have had me running for the Quincy bridge if I had to work it for a month. It paid the bills and left a few weeks of vacation where he would complain about having to go back all the while coughing from inhaling toxic fumes.  That was not a dream.

 I'm not asking you to write down what you need, I am asking you to write down what you want- don't settle! Stop letting your self esteem hold you back. Open your mind and dream! Matt did- he's going to be a nurse.  Some day many many many years from now!  If you knew Matt, a nurse would be the last career you would place him in.  But Matt isn't letting self esteem hold him back.  He already did that for to long, too!

Aren't you worthy of greatness?